White v. Zane

Decided June 6, 1862

Michigan Supreme Court · decided 1862-06-06

Rachel J. Zane, the wife of defendant, died in December, 1860, and plaintiff ivas appointed administrator on her estate by the Probate Court of Cass county, where the parties resided at the time of her decease. As such administrator he brought trover against defendant, for the conversion of a promissory note and certain articles of household goods and wearing apparel alleged to have belonged to Mrs. Zane in her lifetime.

Relies on Wales v. Newbould

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1862-06-06

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently March 1901

4 state decisions

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Martin Ch. J.:

¶1The property of the wife does not, under our statute, become the husband’s by user, or by the simple possession of it by him. The object of the statute was to prevent this result, and to abolish the common law rule respecting the marital rights of the husband over his wife’s property.

¶2The husband can not acquire the property of -his wife except by gift or purchase, any more than he can that of a feme sole. Such gift or purchase must be established by some other evidence than that of use and possession. (See Wales v. Newbould, 9 Mich. 45).

¶3The judgment must be reversed, and a judgment entered for the plaintiff for $220,98, as of September 13, 1861, with costs of both courts.

Manning and Campbell JJ. concurred.Christiancy J. was absent when the case was decided.